There is no new Iron Chef Yomigaeru episode tonight, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to share another classic Iron Chef special with you.
Tonight, I present the Iron Chef World Cup 1995. Kaga is taking Kitchen Stadium to, well. . .an actual stadium.
Some things to look for in the first ten minutes:
–Kaga makes quite an entrance.
–I love the parade of all the previous challengers (look for your favorites).
–And how great would it have been to sit in the stands and enjoy the live orchestra and choir presenting the theme music.
The first challenger is the head of a three star restaurant in France, Pierre Gagnaire. (You may remember him from the France Special and the recently added BKS video that followed Takeshi Kaga to various restaurants to celebrate his milestone years.) Next is an Italian chef whose restaurant rated 19.6 out of 20 in an Italian restaurant guide similar to the Michelin guide, Gianfranco Vissani. The third chef in this World Cup challenge is from the Regal Hong Kong Hotel, Hui Shing. And finally, we have Iron Chef Rokusaburo Michiba to round out the quartet of master chefs.
We get to see highlights from the two preliminary battles that were held to determine the finalists.
–Gianfranco Vissani vs. Pierre Gagnaire in the Europe battle with a theme ingredient of Maguro (Tuna)
–Rokusaburo Michiba vs. Hui Shing in the Asia battle with a theme ingredient of Ika (Squid).
Michiba vs. Vissani in the final. Who will be crowed the champion of Iron Chef World Cup 1995.
Ep. 339OA – Iron Chef World Cup 1995 – Michiba vs. Vissani – Duck – 10/6/1995
This episode is in Japanese with NO subtitles.
It’s hard to believe it was five years ago today, on February 1, 2008, that this website went live.
For those who don’t know the history of the site: There used to be a website called Stage6, which could be described as kind of like a divx driven Youtube. (And that’s why a lot of the older episodes here are in divx format.) People could create channels and upload videos. I stumbled upon an Iron Chef channel and noticed I had some episodes that they didn’t have available. At some point in late 2007, a lot of the videos were removed from the channel by the website. (I still don’t know why.) It was then decided that it would be a good idea to put up our own site to host the episodes. I’m the only one still around for updating this site (as sporadic as that gets sometimes), but it wouldn’t be here without those from the Stage6 days like DoomTurtle (Bill), Hevilift (Paul), Silent Inferno (James), Lostbabee (Angie), and I’m sure many others I’ve forgotten. (So sorry if I did. Let me know and I’ll gladly add you to the list.)
There have been many highlights during these last five years.
–We now have access to the entire run of dubbed episodes that were aired on Food Network.
–I have added 60+ episodes that Food Network never aired including many subtitled episodes from the pre-FN days and original Japanese language broadcasts. (And I still have more. I just need to get them up for you.)
–Over 75 videos in Beyond Kitchen Stadium where you get to see Iron Chef in a new light.
–Added several specials including World Cup 1997, Beijing Special, Japan Cup 2002
–Received a request from family of a challenger to see their episode. And I’m now Facebook “friends” with two challengers.
–While it isn’t the only place on the internet to get a copy of the new Japanese episodes, I try to make it one of the most convenient for you.
And you can still read every post that’s ever been made here, from that first one, to some of my goofy Episodes of the Week posts, up through today. (I was hoping we would hit 400,000 downloads before this anniversary day hit, but I’m still about 700 short of that number as of this morning.)
I will have a new “classic” special ready to go up tonight. Look forward to that.
Thank you all for your support, comments, and suggestions for these last five years. I look forward to many more.
Keith (aka Tuthead)
The Iron Chef Collection